Well, that... wanted to be a much better episode than it really was? It was cute. Eleven and Clara are adorbs. It also didn't even try to have a plot that made sense, which would be more forgivable if it didn't try to shove forward into a big melodramatic climax that I guess was supposed to give us lots of feelings, but it felt cheap and not earned at all and I was still too busy trying to figure out basic elements of the plot and what things were even supposed to mean. Most of which were never made clear at all. Not earning your big emotional climax is a bit of a stupid error to fall into when you have an entire subplot about using objects of personal value as currency, but then again maybe that's what Neil Cross was trying to do, cash in on our feelings about the show's history in a cheap and exploitative manner.

Also, Who fandom seems completely divided between "Murray Gold is awesome" and "Murray Gold should be dragged out back and shot for crimes against good taste," and I think this is the only time I've jumped ship into the latter camp since the choirs of angels sang Ten to his angsty drawn-out rest.

Perhaps I am being overly mean. It's just that I very very rarely outright dislike an episode of Who right after it airs, normally I am all over defending them and pointing out their redeeming qualities even if the execution was botched, and this time I just... can't. It's making me cranky.

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Depends whether you'd be watching for other elements despite an utterly incoherent plot? Eleven and Clara play off each other beautifully when they're not being co-opted into pushing a turgid and under-explained series of events along; Clara plays beautifully off the little girl guest star; we get some backstory and characterization stuff for her; the CGI and prosthetics work is A+++ spectacular. But I can't get over how awful the plot was and how many delusions it had of being amazing.

Really I think what needs to happen is for the Beeb to knock a zero off the show's budget and decree that the showrunner can't have any side projects. Because it's arguable that Torchwood sank RTD's writing on Who, and I suspect Moffat is phoning it in and not developing any of his plots properly because he's stretched thin with Sherlock. And if he wants to be able to give us more aliens and planets, great, but it seems almost as though the BBC wrote him a blank check for the 50th and he's blowing it all on spectacle and bad Photoshop promos to cover for the writing.

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Hmm. That does sound like it has stuff I'd like. And I was gonna watch it anyway, I'm not ready to ditch DW just yet. I just needed to know how much of a priority it should be.

Yeah, I agree. Moffat as a writer has always been inclined to go for the immediate visual spectacle and emotional wallop over telling an actual coherent story, and it's showing more and more. Something needs to be done before his era as showrunner jumps the shark.

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Okay, so I watched the episode and - I don't know what happened? Like, I'm pretty sure the moral was AND EVERYONE IS IMPORTANT but that's what EVERY episode is about so I don't know why it needed a dramatic climax. Man, at this point I'm just watching this show because old and once-fulfilling habits die hard. Wake me up when the next showrunner takes over.

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Yeah, there is undoubtedly some interesting meta in there about, like, Eleven fighting by surrendering, and the value of potential over experience, but I am really sick of Moffat-era Who plunking the meta down in front of us without embedding it in a decent story. It's a really bad sign when the list of things your audience is still stumped about starts with "so wait, does he still have his memories or not?", goes on through "do they sacrifice a kid every year or just when someone sings off-key?", and ends with "...was that a planet or a star?! Either way, CONGRATS ON DESTROYING A CIVILIZATION THERE I bet they'll have fun whirling aimlessly through the vacuum of space." That's like... really, really basic plot fail.